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News and Highlights: From the Vault (August 2005)

Between August 6-8, 1835, Baltimore mobs demontrated against the Bank of Maryland and its directors. Financiers in charge of the Bank of Maryland lost money through reckless speculations, to the detriment of the Bank’s small depositors. A run on the Bank of Baltimore forced the banks to close down, and many depositors never recovered their savings. When the bank did not reopen by 1835, Baltimoreans vented their frustrations in a week of rioting.

Joseph Raynes, a saddle maker who had arrived in Baltimore from Derbyshire, England, in 1831, was concerned about the danger posed to his own property, and responded promptly to threats of arson sweeping the city by insuring his stock. Ultimately, the unrest in Baltimore convinced Joseph to consider moving...

In a letter to his family dated March 24, 1836, Joseph wrote:

My reason is for mooving [moving] from Baltimore since the banks failed in Baltimore. Confidence is lost consequently makes money scarce and great competition they was a dreadful Riot in Baltimore last August...on account of the banks which as been a great ingerry [inquiry] to Baltimore it was reported thay [there] was not less then fifteen people shot dead and about forty wounded the amount of property damaged during the mob was not less than fifty thousand dollars.

Maryland Manuscript #444

The Bank of Baltimore

Statement from Evan Poultney, a director of the Bank of Maryland From Maryland Manuscript #444

The University of Maryland Libraries hold selected papers of Joseph Raynes